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The monsters in my closet were real. They had three names: Crush, Kill, and Destroy. During the daytime they’d chase me with snakes or meet me in the garage where fear met darkness in cracks of light and my little heart beat holes in 4 year old me.

Years later, undefined panic sent me to a seer, a shrink with a gift. Blurred lines cleared into cracks of light in the walls. My story made sense. The sacred book that is my life reveals itself in unwritten pages.

For day 2, Elizabeth prompts us “to write about something we have never written about before: a secret, a childhood fear, something avoided or purposely ignored. Something we have left unwritten.” She provided six words to include in our writing today.

undefined, book, lines, fear, gift, secret

When I saw where this was headed, I decided to write a haibun. A haibun is prose interspersed with haiku. There are holes in this story that may never get filled. Still, it was good to explore it. Thanks for the prompt, Elizabeth.

Note on the title* A leaverite is a rock that you should put back. You should leave ‘er right where you found her. A leaverite. My dad told me about leaverites to discourage childhood’s bulging pebble pockets. My pockets continue to bulge.

Built upon the wreckage of myself
I am a madwoman
Bleeding secrets like a mouthless doll
Insurrection
Resurrection
Rejection
Words are blind howls
Mouthed beneath a werewolf moon

Surrender to the tingling burn of scorpion stings
I am a madwoman
Incessantly spinning spells like a branded witch
Ear to the ball
Mouth on fire
Hunted and alone
Words are werewolf howls
Left beneath an empty moon
Sacred and afraid

Introspection
Intervention
Resurrection
Built upon the wreckage of myself
I am a madwoman

Annihilating ire
I rise

Brenda Warren 2015

Visit The Sunday Whirl

Notes: The first line came from ‘Incendiary’ by Chris Cleave. In it, the narrator writes “I am a woman built on the wreckage of myself.” pg 80 – I spent the last two days steeped in that book, witnessing the narrator descend into madness. This is my reading response.

Apples hold secrets like forests hold trees
deep in the husks of their seeds.
Secrets like cyanide can become lethal
and exile desires to breathe.
Screaming for freedom, secrets are stories,
peering up from beneath our dis-
ease.

Process Notes: The first two lines are from The Soul’s Arsonist, a poem I wrote in June. After writing about three blind spiders, the piece stopped. Clicking on the apple tag in the sidebar I found apples and secrets in two lines of a piece, and started over using them for this week’s Whirl. It was nice to see the spiders spin in again. Little pieces can form bigger pieces. Eden’s Promise is best served aloud. I like it. I didn’t use the words rash or claws from the wordle.

The neighbors howl in the night
allowing sick family values
to spill across their lawn
into Luna’s waning light.

In my bed, I translate words that slur
through the air to my window
and detect escalating anger.

It’s seconds past 2 a.m.

Intractable accusations
lead to F-bombs and wailing
and I wonder if they’re drunk enough
to forget the mistakes they weave together
in the small hours of day.
These eruptions leave traces
of angst across our yards
that linger like confiscated notes
exposing secrets between friends

My conscience tells me to shut the window,
to call the police, to confront them,
but instead I lie here and listen.

There’s no rest on Avenue B tonight.

Brenda Warren 2013

Process notes: These words were difficult for me. I did not use “lab.” I wanted to write a piece about summer, but the darkness in the words prohibited its completion. So instead, I wrote about my neighbors. Although this happens a few times a year, they are generally nice people.

You are a moon poet
standing on a hole
of dark stillness
forgetting how to write.
Slowly your emptiness
rises
to the heavens
in blocks of
freezing sea.

You are a drought poet
above a new
vibrant rain
starting dry, shriveled
poems. As you begin,
your poems quickly
come home
and stop outside
country roads
between grassy fields.

You are a shore poet
ridden by a
beach bum after
you forget to write.
Your poems walk home
and hate,
drowning with birds
in red shimmering
sand.

You are an outside poet
without floors
forgetting to write.
Your poems rise
from prairie grasses
and whisper secrets
to you.

You are an Earth poet
ridden by
trees, and stones, and people.
Your poems come
home
warm and glowing
discovered
in the present moment
right before your eyes.

Brenda Warren 2013

Here is the prompt for the final day of NaPoWriMo: “Find a shortish poem that you like, and rewrite each line, replacing each word (or as many words as you can) with words that mean the opposite. For example, you might turn “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?” to “I won’t contrast you with a winter’s night.” Your first draft of this kind of opposite poem will likely need a little polishing, but this is a fun way to respond to a poem you like, while also learning how that poem’s rhetorical strategies really work. (It’s sort of like taking a radio apart and putting it back together, but for poetry). Happy writing!”

The piece I chose was written by a sixth grade student on the Utah Navajo Reservation. It is called “My Poems.” I found it in the book Rising Voices.

Process Notes:
Day 20: Miz Quickly asked for a prose poem with precise word choice, and the folks at NaPo provided a list of words, from which we were to select five. I used ghost, elusive, mercurial, curl, and squander.

Dervishes revolve in harmony with both stars and cells
invoking God in everything that exists.
Vermin. Heretics. Words used by humans who lack
understanding and house narrow minds.
Lies hide secrets to appease the greater populace,
governed by bullies disguised as leaders who
invoke fear, scattering fringe elements.
Not being true to your own ideals
generates hypocrisy.
Spin your truth like the dervish
erode tyranny with tenacity
like rivers spread canyons through stone.
Fight oppression with honest expression.

Brenda Warren 2013

Miz Quickly’s is a click away.

Process Notes:
Miz Quickly prompted us to follow the form found here. The phrase divulging self is the acrostic I used to guide the piece. From there I opened my trusty purple dictionary to the letter “d” and put my finger on a word, dervish. That word along with the acrostic guided the content of the piece. It’s not my favorite but it works. And hey, Day 8 is complete with a poem to post.